


Albion Unwound.

by Larry_say_relax



Category: The Libertines
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-10
Updated: 2013-03-10
Packaged: 2017-12-04 19:52:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/714455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Larry_say_relax/pseuds/Larry_say_relax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Carl loves Pete, nothing new there. Angst and sad reminiscing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Albion Unwound.

Strange how things never turn out the way you think they will. Odd that sometimes, getting what you want is the furthest thing from what you really want. Carl is shagging a girl in a filthy toilet which is connected to a grimy green room. The gig was explosive, the after party was in full swing, and he has her up against the door of the stall. She’s young- he doesn’t know how young and he doesn’t want to know.

What he can’t help knowing is that in spite of her squeals she isn’t really enjoying this. Not the way she’s pretending to, at least. She’s faking. They always fucking fake. Who can blame them? Who in her right mind could get off in a situation like this? It’s never the way they think its going to be- there aren’t slow kisses or murmurs of devotion-it’s just a quick fuck in a dirty toilet, their fingers always scrabbling for something to hold onto as he finishes desperately, wanting only to get it over with.

 

He does just that and then she’s tugging up her knickers and pushing hair out of her sweaty streaked face. She’s trying to smile up at him but he’s already unlatching the door. He’s feeling sleazy, and not in a way that makes him feel good. He glances down and her bare legs look blotchy and ugly to him. There’s an indentation on her thigh where his belt buckle had been pressed. It looks like a welt and he feels sick.

 

”Thanks, love” he murmurs, and pushes past her. Peter’s gone one better (or worse)—he’s on the floor, giving the time to an older girl who looks like she might actually be enjoying it. Peter’s jeans are down around his knees and Carl can see dark wet urine stains on them because the floor is filthy and unmopped. He sees that Peter’s hands are wet with it too, and he wonders if Peter has noticed, if he even cares. Muscles writhe under a skinny back that looks far too pale in the washroom lighting. A thin line of blood has run out of one nostril, and it’s dripping down into the girl’s dishwater blonde hair. He averts his gaze and walks out, buckling up.

 

Later in the Albion Rooms, Peter is sprawled on the sofa, a beer clenched between his knees as he softly strums a song about gin, tea cups, leaves on the lawn. Usually this song makes Carl happy but tonight it makes him want to cry. He wants a shower but at the same time he doesn’t want to be alone, not even for a second. Sometimes Peter is like the sun—Carl needs his light and warmth to live, to thrive, to exist. He’s not sure why this is—especially as there are plenty of times when he wants to strangle him with his bare hands. He thinks about that occasionally, how sometimes they roll around on the floor, locked into each other furiously, punching and growling and livid and it isn’t play at all. He’s the stronger of the two but somehow at the end of it, even if he’s bloody and beaten, Peter will force himself to laugh and that means he’s won. Peter, it seems, always wins.

 

Carl hits Peter more than Peter hits him because he’s in love with him. And this enrages him. Like the time they were standing in the kitchen and Peter pulled a bottle out of the fridge and casually drank right from the mouth of it—Carl hated that such an uncivilized gesture looked so gorgeous, so utterly Arcadian from Peter. Especially when that sort of behavior drove him mad from anyone else- Peter KNOWS this, he fucking well knows this and he does it anyway, licking the cream from his lips with this insufferable air of mingled sloth and arrogance and Carl is pushed over the edge. He hears nothing but his heartbeat as he leaps for him, shouting one word-

 

“BASTARD!” , further infuriated by Peter’s delighted laugh as he throws his arms out and half catches his friend and they tumble to the floor, his rage ignited further when he realizes that not only has he got an erection but that Peter can feel it pressing against his thigh, is grinning up at him, is shouting gleefully between chortles (and ducking his head from Carl’s frustrated half-slaps half punches), “Do I make you horny, Carlos (a la Austin Powers, no less)?”

 

Wrestling ensues, Peter laughing as he douses Carl with what’s left of the milk in the bottle he’s still gripping in one hand, Carl’s hands slipping and sliding in it as Peter wriggles like a salmon ashore, flapping and wriggling and giggling and always fucking beautiful, always fucking perfect, eyes flashing like twin dark moons in winter.

 

When they’re exhausted they collapse and Peter croons his friend’s name, arms snaking up around his back and over his shoulders.

 

”Don’t be cross, Biggles. It’s only spilt milk.” And Carl is getting to his feet, his breath shaky and his hair soaked to the roots with mingled milk and sweat. Carl is confused and unnerved (as always) and mutters something about needing a shower. Peter guffaws and smirks-

 

”Better make it a cold one, mate” and Carl does just that.

 

Carl thinks about things like this as Peter plays the guitar at 5 am on a Saturday morning, as the bruises beneath Peter’s eyes grow steadily darker, as the sky outside (in contrast) lightens. His body hurts from the comedown, from where the girl’s fingers had bitten into his back, from being just plain tired and he wants a shower- he can still smell the girl’s perfume on his skin and it smells like sugared apples and he doesn’t really like it. He likes the way he smells after waking up in the lumpy old bed he shares with Peter- all warm maleness and a sort of musk, cigarettes and whatever Peter consumed the night before, sweated out and soaked into his own skin. He likes the way Peter smells when they’ve stumbled home from the pub drunk and in secret unspoken love and they kiss and touch for hours before falling asleep. Carl likes the way Peter’s feet grip his own under the blankets when it’s cold in the flat, the way they share hand rolled fags in the dark when they haven’t enough money to buy the good kind.

 

A few years ago, shagging nameless girls in toilets after gigs had seemed something to aspire to. His desire for endless female attention had blinded him to the fact that all he needed was there the whole time, right beside him. Would it have made a difference, had he known?

 

Carl watches Peter play his guitar and he knows that he will never have him the way he wants to. He can have his body, maybe, some day when they finally push past the paper thin barriers that still hold them back on those lost drunken nights, but he’ll never own him. Peter is feral, wild, beautiful. Peter is a nocturnal thing that fears cages more than death and this is why his heart will always belong to only himself.

 

Carl admits defeat at last and turns his back on the boy weaving wonder and beauty out of cutting metal strings and undresses alone, stepping into the jets of water. He feels the girl being washed away and thinks about how nothing ever turns out the way you think it will.


End file.
